The Storyteller (YA)

Book #72 Read in 2012
The Storyteller by Antonia Michaelis

This book was hard to put down but also hard to get through.  Anna is drawn to Abel, a mysterious student at her school.  He has a reputation as a hard core drug dealer.  She begins to spy on him and realizes that he is the caregiver for his younger sister, Micha.  Abel spins stories to entertain Micha and uses the stories as a way of talking about what is going on in their lives.  Anna earns her role in these stories as she gets more and more sucked into the lives of Abel and Micha.  This book has raw parts that are incredibly graphic and characters are so complex that it is hard to figure out who is good and who is bad.

This book was interesting in a train wreck, can't put it down sort of way.  Abel is at once hero and villain.  Anna is at once victim and enabler.  They are tough to compartmentalize.  This book is edgy and has powerful elements to it.